How to Use aphelion in a Sentence

aphelion

noun
  • The reverse is true at the most distant orbital point from the sun (aphelion), and the true sun moves ahead of the mean sun.
    — Phil Plait, Scientific American, 5 June 2025
  • The sun is around three million miles farther away at aphelion than at perihelion.
    — Mike Lynch, Twin Cities, 5 July 2026
  • These are from aphelion and perihelion in 2005, but the scale is always about the same every year.
    — Phil Plait, Discover Magazine, 5 July 2012
  • For the next six months or so, our planet will slowly move away from the sun, reaching its most distant point—aphelion—on July 5.
    — Phil Plait, Scientific American, 5 Jan. 2024
  • Image On Friday, Earth will swing toward the outermost point in its orbit, known as aphelion.
    — Shannon Hall, New York Times, 5 July 2018
  • Earth reaches aphelion July 3, the most distant spot on its imperfect, annual orbit around the sun.
    — Blaine P. Friedlander Jr., Washington Post, 1 July 2017
  • Clouds that form during this time at the planet's equator are known as the aphelion cloud belt, according to NASA.
    — Kenna Hughes-Castleberry, Space.com, 9 June 2025
  • At aphelion, water has an abundance of less than one part per million in Mars’s skies, compared to more than 50 parts per million at perihelion.
    — Jeffrey Kluger, TIME, 6 Sep. 2024
  • Apart from Mercury, no other natural object in our solar system is known to have a smaller aphelion—the point at which an orbiting body is farthest from the sun.
    — Katherine J. Wu, Smithsonian Magazine, 21 Jan. 2020
  • Mars’ orbit is more elliptical than Earth’s, so the difference between perihelion and aphelion is greater.
    — Dave Epstein, BostonGlobe.com, 11 July 2018
  • The closest of these run-ins occurs when Earth reaches aphelion, or its farthest point from the sun, and when Mars reaches perihelion, its closest point to the sun.
    — Jennifer Leman, Popular Mechanics, 5 Oct. 2020
  • Over the past centuries, Mars’ orbit has been getting more and more elongated, carrying the planet even nearer to the sun at perihelion and even farther away at aphelion.
    — Dave Epstein, BostonGlobe.com, 11 July 2018
  • The exact distances of Earth’s perihelion and aphelion change a bit from year to year because of the gravitational influence of the other planets, as well as that of the moon.
    — Phil Plait, Scientific American, 30 June 2023
  • Perihelion -- closest approach -- happens in early January, and aphelion six months later.
    — Phil Plait, Discover Magazine, 4 July 2011
  • Earth reaches aphelion on Monday, July 6, 2026, placing the planet at its farthest point from the sun in 2026.
    — Jamie Carter, Forbes.com, 5 July 2026
  • Earth reaches its farthest point from the sun, aphelion, on July 6, 2026, yet the Northern Hemisphere endures intense summer heat.
    — Jamie Carter, Forbes.com, 5 July 2026
  • Each year, during wintertime in the northern hemisphere, the Earth reaches its closest point to the sun, or perihelion, and during the northern hemisphere summer the Earth hits the farthest point from the sun, or aphelion.
    — Jay Bennett, Popular Mechanics, 18 Aug. 2017
  • The clouds occur when air rushes up the volcanoes' slopes, cooling and condensing into visible vapor, and are particularly dense when Mars is at aphelion—the farthest point along its orbit from the Sun.
    — Margherita Bassi, Smithsonian Magazine, 9 June 2025
  • Since the Earth’s orbit around the sun is not a perfect circle, its closest approach to the sun is in early January, known as perihelion, and its farthest distance is in early July, known as aphelion.
    — Mike Lynch, Twin Cities, 5 July 2026
  • Though perihelion occurs during winter in the Northern Hemisphere and aphelion occurs during summer, Earth's elliptical orbit around the sun does not cause the seasons.
    — NBC News, 5 Jan. 2022
  • Confirming the rocket firing, SpaceX released initial data indicating the Roadster was headed for an elliptical orbit around the sun with a high point, or aphelion, out in the asteroid belt, well beyond the orbit of Mars.
    — William Harwood, CBS News, 7 Feb. 2018
  • Earth’s Elliptical Orbit Earth’s elliptical orbit causes slight variations in solar energy, with about 7% more sunlight reaching Earth during perihelion than aphelion.
    — Jamie Carter, Forbes, 4 Jan. 2025
  • However, this difference is very slight, with the sun having an angular size of 32 arcminutes and 31 arcseconds at perihelion compared to 31 arcminutes and 27 arcseconds at aphelion, according to In-The-Sky.
    — Anthony Wood, Space.com, 3 Jan. 2026

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'aphelion.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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